Misogyny In The Odyssey

Control is perhaps the most universally powerful and unfulfilled desire anyone has. History has exposed that cravings for control over social situations, emotions, body image, financial states, etc. are passed down exponentially through every generation. In the past century a global movement has occurred displaying humans being aggressively protective of control over their own and others freedom. Whether it is race, gender, social class, age, or religion, you name it and someone is complaining about being unjustly suppressed. For these reasons the topic of misogyny and women’s rights is a hot and very much argued topic of the 21st century. Women have been seen throughout the world’s history as property or victims, caregivers, seductresses, …show more content…
All humans, including men, possess qualities that could put them in multiple or all of these positions that can be seen evolve and devolve throughout ancient literature in Homer’s The Odyssey, Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, Euripides’ The Trojan Women, and Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Women being seen as property and/or made victims is the oldest and probably the most discussed role of women. Dating back to 450 B.C., Euripides achieves a clear image of the enslavement of women by men. Hecuba, a powerful and influential Queen before the fall of her husband and her city, Troy, is made a slave to a leader of her enemy, Odysseus. In The Trojan Women, Euripides confirms that women were viewed as possessions to be traded and given as prizes to war heroes and powerful men. Hecuba, along with her daughters and many other women of Troy, lament over their loss of husbands and freedom. The sacrifice of their control is described as synonymous with, “a slave death-shapen, as the stones that lie hewn on a dead man's grave” (Euripides). The women’s recognition between loss of freedom and death provides evidence of the potent influence of control. Women are also commonly used in ancient literature as prizes and catalysts for gaining control, such as the